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Universal Music Group (UMG) chairman/CEO Lucian Grainge released his annual New Year’s memo to staff on Monday (Feb. 3), about a month later than usual owing to the wildfires that broke out in Los Angeles in early January.
In the 3,113-word letter, Grainge retreaded much of the same ground covered in his 2023 and 2024 New Year’s addresses and his presentation at the company’s Capital Markets Day in September, including mentions of “Streaming 2.0,” “responsible AI,” “artist-centric” approaches, “super fans” and more.
Grainge began the letter by noting UMG’s accomplishments over the last year, including breaking new artists like Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan, working with Taylor Swift — the most streamed artist globally on Spotify, Amazon and Deezer — and Apple Music’s Artist of the Year Billie Eilish, adding that “achievements like these don’t just happen.”
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“Those achievements were greatly assisted by our continuing self-reinvention, reshaping our organizational structure,” wrote Grainge, referring to the widespread restructuring of UMG’s recorded music division in 2024 that led to layoffs. “Within months we were operating with greater agility and efficiency. We then saw something exceptional take place.”
As the largest music company in the world enters 2025, Grainge reminded his staff that UMG is still a “relative minnow” compared to the trillion-dollar tech companies it calls its partners. Still, he noted that UMG was successful in ushering in its “artist-centric strategy,” a term he introduced two years ago to describe UMG’s efforts to better monetize music and to limit gaming of the systems.
“Not only do we want to ensure that artists are protected and rewarded, but we’re also going after bad actors who are actively engaged in nefarious behavior such as large-scale copyright infringement,” he wrote. In the last year, UMG forged new deals with TikTok, Spotify and Amazon to aid in those efforts. Also in 2024, UMG sued AI companies Suno and Udio and music distributor Believe to prevent what Grainge called “large-scale copyright infringement.”
Grainge then detailed his plans to influence and set the ground rules for “Streaming 2.0” — or “the next era of streaming” — with UMG’s partners. He pointed back to new agreements with Amazon and Spotify as major wins, adding, “We expect that similar agreements with other major platforms will be coming in the months ahead.”
He also discussed the company’s goal of finding ways to “accelerat[e] our direct to consumer and superfan strategy,” building on past moves like its strategic partnership and investment in NTWRK and Complex. “This year will see us expanding our product offerings to fans, as we continue to redefine the ‘merch’ category and create superfan collectibles and experiences,” Grainge wrote.
He also noted the company’s focus to “aggressively grow our presence in high potential markets,” whether that’s through A&R, artist and label service agreements or mergers and acquisitions. In the last year, UMG has managed to work towards this goal by announcing that Virgin had entered an agreement to acquire Downtown Music Holdings, purchasing the remaining share of [PIAS] and partnering with Mavin Global in Nigeria.
“The reason so many independent music entrepreneurs actively seek to partner with UMG when they have more alternatives than ever before is that we provide what they’re seeking… After all, we’re not a financial institution that views music as an ‘asset,’” he wrote. “And we’re not an aggregator that views music as ‘content.’ We are a music company built by visionary music entrepreneurs. For us, music is a vital — perhaps the vital — art form.”
Grainge ended on a high note, writing, “Let me leave you with this: Some will try to disrupt our business or criticize us. That we know. It comes with being in the most competitive market that music and music-based entertainment has ever seen, and it comes with being the industry’s leader and primary driving force. But our vision and our ability to consistently execute gives us the momentum to continue to succeed and grow.”
Read Grainge’s full New Year’s note to staff below.
Dear Colleagues:
When I wrote my first letter about the L.A. fires, I said that my annual New Year’s note would have to come later than usual. And so here it is…
Last night’s Grammy awards served as a perfect metaphor for our company’s performance in 2024—breaking new artists and taking our superstars to new heights. In fact, last night, UMG artists and songwriters brought home more Grammys than ever before in our history. You can read more about that here.
Thanks to your day-in, day-out dedication and hard work, we accomplished so much together in 2024 and are positioning ourselves for another great year of success. I’ll sum up some of UMG’s stunning achievements last year and give you a glimpse of what we plan for this year. Our company’s fundamental building block is artist developmentand in 2024, investment in new talent continued to produce spectacular results around the world. Consider the following facts: that UMG broke the two biggest artists in the world last year in Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan; Taylor Swift was the most streamed globally on Spotify, Amazon and Deezer; and Apple Music named Billie Eilish its Artist of the Year. And that a UMG recording artist who is also signed to UMPG as a songwriter had the No. 1 song globally on the year-end lists for both Apple Music (Kendrick Lamar) and Spotify (Sabrina Carpenter). Or that UMG had four of the Top 5 artists globally on Spotify with Taylor Swift (No. 1), The Weeknd, Drake and Billie Eilish; eight of the Top 10 albums (Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department at No. 1); five of the Top 10 songs (Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” at No. 1), and six of the 10 Most Viral songs (Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars’ “Die With A Smile” at No. 1). Or consider that in the U.S., UMG had all Top 3 label groups according to Billboard (Republic, Interscope and Universal Music Enterprises) not to mention four of the Top 5 artists and eight of the Top 10 albums, including all of the Top 5 – Taylor Swift (No. 1 and No. 2), Morgan Wallen, Noah Kahan and Drake. And on YouTube, six of the Top 10 songs (Kendrick Lamar at No. 1) and two spots on the Trending Topics Top 10 across all content categories in 2024 (Kendrick Lamar and Sabrina Carpenter). You can read more of our remarkable achievements around the world at the end of this note, but as you can already see, in 2024, our momentum only grew. Also, these were achievements not only by a few superstars, but also by dozens of artists from around the world—both developing and established—performing in multiple genres, styles and languages. Achievements like these don’t just happen. They are the culmination of maintaining a clear vision of who we are, what we do and where we’re going, then executing on that vision, maintaining momentum and, of course, at the heart of it all, having some absolutely incredible music to work with. And last year those achievements were greatly assisted by our continuing self-reinvention, reshaping our organizational structure, re-building our teams and refining our strategy. A vision which boldly and, when necessary, quickly adapts to an ever-changing world. For example, in early 2024 we executed on our vision to realign our U.S. label structure, and within months we were operating with greater agility and efficiency. We then saw something exceptional take place: UMG had its best U.S. performance in six years, according to Luminate. I’m confident that our realignment will yield still further momentum around the world and that the achievements of our artists and songwriters—as well as UMG’s success—will reach new heights.In 2024, we continued to lead the media industry in our embrace and advancement of “Responsible AI.” Three recent examples of that initiative include our agreements with SoundLabs, ProRata and KLAY—companies that are taking unique approaches to the rapidly evolving AI space through new technologies that provide accurate attribution and tools to empower and compensate artists.Our leadership also includes our commitment to the enactment of Responsible AI public policies, fighting back against so-called text and data mining copyright exceptions and other misguided and ill-intentioned proposals that would enable what I will euphemistically call the unauthorized exploitation of creators’ work. Instead, we will work towards legislative “guardrails” to ensure the healthy evolution and growth of AI that mutually serves creators, consumers and responsibly innovative technology players.In my note last year, I said that 2024 would see us once again attracting the brightest entrepreneurs, expanding our existing relationships with other such talents and investing more resources into providing a full suite of artist services businesses to independent labels around the world. And we did exactly that. We acquired the remaining share of [PIAS] two years after taking an initial stake in the company and brought its highly respected co-founder Kenny Gates into our family. And we grew our geographic footprint. One example: our partnering with and investing in Mavin Global, whose founders Don Jazzy and Tega Oghenejobo continue to lead that company as well as, going forward, all of UMG’s business in Nigeria.Just last month, Virgin announced it entered into an agreement to acquire Downtown Music Holdings, which includes FUGA, Downtown Artist & Label Services, Curve Royalties, CD Baby, Downtown Music Publishing and Songtrust.The reason so many independent music entrepreneurs actively seek to partner with UMG when they have more alternatives than ever before is that we provide what they’re seeking: the most innovate creatives and finest resources that will advance the careers of their artists and achieve their financial goals within a culture that respects artists and their music. After all, we’re not a financial institution that views music as an “asset.” And we’re not an aggregator that views music as “content.” We are a music company built by visionary music entrepreneurs. For us, music is a vital—perhaps the vital—art form. Artists and the music they create are our lifeblood. We’re proud both to invest in businesses that can and do support today’s leading music entrepreneurs and to advocate for the policies and practices that are designed to protect and grow the entire music ecosystem.And finally, one of 2024’s announcements of which I am proudest is the formation of our Global Impact Team, whose mission is to enact positive change in our industry and in the communities in which we serve. This cross-functional group of executives brings a deep understanding of our global organization and will develop and execute strategies to tackle a variety of critical issues, including: equality; mental health and wellness; food insecurity and the unhoused; the environment; and education. By dovetailing seamlessly with our goals and those of our artists, we can promote and even catalyze beneficial and authentic changes where they are needed. Recently, in the wake of the terrible Los Angeles wildfires, the Impact Team mobilized, offering support to those affected, activating a multi-pronged relief effort to help both our own employees and the broader L.A. communities.Before I get to what lies ahead for 2025, let me first provide you with some context as to the enviable position UMG holds.UMG is a global creative enterprise at the center of an ecosystem of hundreds of digital partners. And while we’ve consistently been the music industry’s leader since the advent of the streaming era—an era whose dawn we were instrumental in ushering in—the leadership posture among our DSP partners has undergone some significant changes. For example, one of our fastest-growing subscription partners, YouTube, is also one of the most recently launched. We expect more inevitable jockeying for the leadership position among standalone platforms as well as among the music services that are divisions of trillion-dollar valuation tech companies.But, even though we are a relative minnow in comparison to a trillion-dollar tech company, the music of our incredible artists and songwriters enables us to exercise outsized influence on the global stage and serve as a critical catalyst in fostering a truly competitive commercial marketplace for music. We will keep using our position to promote a healthy and sustainable music ecosystem that benefits all artists at all stages of their careers.Now to 2025 … starting with our artist-centric strategy:When we introduced that strategy two years ago, we immediately went to work with our partners to make it a reality. In a matter of months, we reached agreements in principle on a number of issues: increasing the monetization of artists’ music; limiting the gaming of the system by protecting against fraud and content saturation; and focusing on the value of authentic artist-fan relationships, inspiring the development of more engaging consumer experiences, including specially designed new products and premium tiers for superfans. Platforms as diverse as Deezer, Spotify, TikTok, Meta and most recently Amazon, have adopted artist-centric principles in a wide variety of ways—principles that benefit the entire music industry from DIY to independent to major label artists and songwriters.Our work in driving these artist-centric principles will continue in 2025. Not only do we want to ensure that artists are protected and rewarded, but we’re also going after bad actors who are actively engaged in nefarious behavior such as large-scale copyright infringement. To that end, we’re setting forth the best practices that every responsible platform, distributor and aggregator should adopt: content filtering; checks for infringement across streaming and social platforms; penalty systems for repeat infringers; chain-of-custody certification and name-and-likeness verification. If every platform, distributor and aggregator were to adopt these measures and commit to continue to employ the latest technology to thwart bad actors, we would create an environment in which artists will reach more fans, have more economic and creative opportunities, and dramatically diminish the sea of noise and irrelevant content that threatens to drown out artists’ voices.In September, during our Capital Markets Day presentation, I described what would constitute the next era of streaming—Streaming 2.0. Built on a foundation of artist-centric principles, Streaming 2.0 will represent a new age of innovation, consumer segmentation, geographic expansion, greater consumer value and ARPU growth.I’m pleased to report that the Streaming 2.0 era has arrived. We recently announced a new agreement with Amazon that includes many of these elements, and just last week, we announced a multi-year agreement with Spotify. We expect that similar agreements with other major platforms will be coming in the months ahead. In 2025, we’ll also be reaching out in new ways to engage fans. In addition to listening to their favorite artists’ music, fans want to build deeperconnectionsto artists they love. Last year, in accelerating our direct-to-consumer and superfan strategy, we formed a strategic partnership and became an investor in NTWRK and Complex to build a premium live-video shopping platform for superfan culture. This year will see us expanding our product offerings to fans, as we continue to redefine the “merch” category and create superfan collectibles and experiences. Some of this will be done through our current partners and some through our own D2C channels, which we will continue scaling to meet the massive appetite of fans. After years of working to aggressively build a healthy commercial environment for artists and music—one in which we have reached approximately 670 million subscribers—we will be laser-focused in 2025 on continuing to expand the ecosystem and improve its monetization. As we did in 2024, this year we will continue to aggressively grow our presence in high potential markets through organic A&R, artist and label services agreements, and M&A.The work that lies ahead of us will bring challenges, no doubt about that. But we will meet those challenges with pride and a sense of privilege, because no other form of creative expression is more fundamental to human existence than music. By that, of course, I mean real music created by human artists. So let me leave you with this:Some will try to disrupt our business or criticize us. That we know. It comes with being in the most competitive market that music and music-based entertainment has ever seen, and it comes with being the industry’s leader and primary driving force. But our vision and our ability to consistently execute gives us the momentum to continue to succeed and grow. Our global worldview and the internal competition fueled by our entrepreneurial spirit breeds innovation. Our passion for finding new and better ways to bring music to the world will keep us ahead of competitors and new entrants alike. We’ll continue to do what we do because what we do and how we do it is impossible to replicate. Our culture and our people—you—are our superpower.I can’t wait to see and hear what this year brings, and I am thrilled to be on this journey with you.Let’s go!Lucian
At this point in his career, Bad Bunny is way beyond breaking records. In 2020, he became the first artist to notch a No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with an all-Spanish album, and he’s the only one to repeat the feat — not one, not two, but four times.
Now, Bad Bunny’s latest album, Debí Tirar Más Fotos, has spent two weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 — and it currently seems poised to notch a third consecutive week atop the tally. Of his four No. 1 albums on the all-genre chart, it’s now the second longest running at the top spot; his 2022 set, Un Verano Sin Ti, collected the most weeks there with 13 non-consecutive weeks.
This week, Debí Tirar Más Fotos is also No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Latin Albums chart, and the song “DtMF” is No. 1 on the Billboard Global 200 chart for the second consecutive week. Bunny, in fact, occupies more than half the top 10 on the Global 200. On Billboard’s Hot Latin Songs chart, nine of the top 10 songs are Bunny’s, including “DtMF” at No. 1.
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It’s an astounding showing, even for an artist as big as Bad Bunny. It’s also worth considering that Debí Tirar Más Fotos debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 following an incomplete debut tracking week due to his decision to release the album on a Sunday — Jan. 5 — in anticipation of the Jan. 6 celebration of Three Kings Day, which is a big deal in Puerto Rico and ties with the album’s love of Puerto Rico theme.
But Bunny quickly made up for lost time with a blitz of finely-tuned and very creative publicity efforts that ping-ponged from the U.S. to Puerto Rico, including his stint co-hosting The Tonight Show alongside Jimmy Fallon, playing a surprise concert at a New York subway station, co-hosting a morning news show in Puerto Rico and surprising local podcaster Chente Ydrach with Puerto Rican parranda.
The final flourish was announcing a 21-date residency at Puerto Rico’s Coliseo de Puerto Rico, with the first several dates available exclusively to Puerto Rican residents.
A major architect in Bunny’s marketing and promotional strategy is Monica Jiménez, director of marketing and brand partnerships at Rimas’ Bad Bunny Division.
Jiménez, who worked with brands like Coty and Procter & Gamble before joining Bunny’s label and management company, works together with Rimas CEO Noah Assad on everything Bad Bunny and was pivotal in executing the artist’s complex vision. The success of Debí Tirar Más Fotos earns her the title of Billboard‘s Executive of the Week.
What exactly was your role in this album’s roll-out?
One of my duties is understand and bring to life the vision of the artist for the album. Benito is an artist who fully immerses himself in the many facets of a release process, including marketing, and it’s crucial to achieve what he visualizes for the project. I usually bring together the amazing ideas of the entire team and also look for new ideas to ensure a robust and strategic plan. I also focus on implementing the plan so it meets expectations, but above all, so it truly represents Benito’s essence as an artist and conveys the message of the project.
So, what was this message? And what was the overlying strategy for the album?
The strategy was telling a story through nostalgia and taking a message of love and appreciation for our upbringing, regardless of where or what that upbringing was. With this album, we underscored our pride for Puerto Rico, and we wanted the whole world to feel this same pride. That’s what we’ve presented in all our storyline and in everything we’ve done inside and outside the island. I think that’s what’s pushed such a special connection between the album and its listeners.
We’re closing in on a third consecutive week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, more than any other of Benito’s albums except for Un Verano Sin Ti. What do you attribute that success to?
DEBí TiRAR MáS FOToS has been a very special project. I think the entire world has seen and understood the essence of what the album wanted to communicate: Benito’s love for his culture and for his Latin people. I believe this has made the reception to the album different [from other albums].
This feels like more of a passion project than any of Benito’s previous albums. Do you think that has had an impact on people’s obsession with it?
Definitely. Benito has always been very vocal about his commitment and love for Puerto Rico. But here, he’s devoted an entire project to his island — not only conceptually but also musically, betting on root genres and on young, local talent like Los Sobrinos [the band on the album, made up of students from Puerto Rico’s Escuela Libre de Música] and Los Pleneros de La Cresta. It’s made people look at the project from another point of view and value it even more.
Benito did more promo for this album than any other. Why? And how did you convince him to do it?
I truly think his connection with the project made everything flow easier. He wanted to do it that way, to support the release in the way he did. The key is ensuring that what we do resonates with him, with his personality as an artist and with his vision. Once we have that, everything is easier.
Can you give me examples of marketing strategies that you thought were particularly effective?
Our strategy to reveal the song names generated a lot of buzz. We collaborated with Google Maps and Spotify, and as part of the collaboration, coordinates for each song on the album’s tracklist were revealed on Spotify, encouraging fans to dive into Google Maps for hidden clues. We not only looked for a different, interactive way to do this, but it led to many people discovering different places on our island.
Another major effort was the short film released prior to the album. The story it told [of an older man, played by filmmaker and actor Jacobo Morales, who reminisces of his life and love for Puerto Rico] was a great preamble to the album. It was an emotional, well-done piece [directed by Bad Bunny himself] that connected with many people in and out of Puerto Rico. Plus, those short previews of different tracks that were included in the video opened up an enormous conversation on social media on what people could expect from the album.
Does it surprise you that such a Latin album is the most consumed in the U.S.?
More than a “Latin” album, it’s about the [Puerto Rican] rhythms that make up the album. I’m definitely positively surprised, and as a Puerto Rican, it fills my heart. It’s a huge step for music as a whole.
What’s next with this album?
We never stop. There are many things coming up around the album. Plus the residency in Puerto Rico, which is something historic and will definitely be special for everyone who comes to visit and enjoy.
Mike Chester has been promoted to general manager of Warner Records, expanding his responsibilities to include digital and viral marketing, as well as artist development, while continuing to oversee promotion and commerce.
Based in Los Angeles, Chester reports to co-chairman & COO Tom Corson and works closely with label CEO & co-chairman Aaron Bay-Schuck on company goals and artist release strategies.
Chester joined Warner in 2018 as executive vp of promotion, later adding commerce to his title in 2021. His leadership has been instrumental in Warner Records’ revitalization, earning him recognition as Billboard‘s Executive of the Week following a barrage of midyear wins in 2024.
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Before Warner, he served as senior vp at Scooter Braun’s SB Projects, working with Justin Bieber and Ariana Grande, and spent over a decade at Def Jam Recordings. He began his career at Arista Records before moving to Atlantic and then Def Jam in 2004.
Corson and Bay-Schuck praised Chester’s leadership, artist relations expertise, and strategic vision, crediting him with playing a key role in Warner’s resurgence.
“He possesses extraordinary leadership qualities, has excellent artist relations skills, and knows how to balance all with confidence, compassion, and integrity,” they said. “He is an invaluable member of our senior management team and we know he will continue to thrive and innovate in his new role.”
Chester also shared his excitement about the new role, emphasizing Warner’s dedication to artist development and innovation.
“The team here at Warner is phenomenal, and our artist roster – from emerging talent to superstars – is second to none,” he said. “We pride ourselves on being the premiere artist development label, and we constantly discover new avenues in which to bring even more music to fans. I’m excited to continue promoting, innovating, and building careers in this dynamic and rapidly expanding musical environment.”
Esha Tewari is taking the next big step in her career. The rising singer-songwriter has officially signed with Warner Music in collaboration with Atlantic Records, setting the stage for a massive year ahead.
The deal, announced today (Jan. 30), marks a pivotal moment for Tewari, who built an impressive following through TikTok and streaming platforms.
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“I am super excited to welcome Esha Tewari to the Warner Music family and to be working with Atlantic Records to take her music to a global audience,” Rosen said. “Esha is an incredible talent with a unique ability to connect with her fans through her songs, and I can’t wait to work with her to amplify her music and her authentic storytelling to every corner of the world.”
For Tewari, the decision to sign with Warner wasn’t just about major-label backing—it was about finding a team that aligned with her fiercely independent vision.
“I’m so excited to be a part of the Warner Music family,” Tewari comments in a statement. “From LA to New York, we met with executives who spoke about an evolving label system that now gives artists more ownership and control. Warner stood out as their actions matched their words.”
She continues, “Especially this early in my career, the deal I have done with Warner Music gives me the ability to remain hands-on with the whole creative vision, and allows me to remain the leader of my now expanded team.”
Tewari first started making waves in February 2024 by posting covers and original songs on TikTok, quickly amassing a loyal fanbase she calls “Tewarians.”
Her independently released single “Beautiful Boy” went viral, catapulting her to over 601,000 monthly Spotify listeners, 217,000 Instagram followers, and 172,000 TikTok followers.
Her success continued with the release of two EPs—i can and Better Off—which helped establish her indie-folk sound. Now, she’s gearing up for her third EP, led by the heartfelt new single “You Were Mine,” which has already racked up 17,000 TikTok creations using the original sound.
With her career gaining momentum, Tewari is preparing for a North American tour in mid-2025, but first, she’s returning to Australian stages this April and May for her second national headline tour.
If the demand is anything to go by, she’s becoming a serious live force—Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, and Perth have already sold out, prompting a second show in Perth, while Adelaide is nearing capacity. It follows her completely sold-out Australian tour in November 2024.
As of January, Warner Music Group (WMG) executive vp/general counsel Paul Robinson has worked in the legal department of the company for 30 years. During that time, he has seen “three different owners, seven CEOs and we’ve gone private and public two different times,” he says. “There also have been all of these macro changes in the music business” — which is something of an understatement. What hasn’t changed much, he says, is the culture of the company: “It’s always been an artist- friendly, songwriter-friendly culture, and we’ve always had a great relationship between recorded music and publishing.”
Robinson was slated to receive the 2025 Entertainment Law Initiative Service Award on Jan. 31 at the organization’s annual Grammy Week luncheon at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel. But since the event was canceled in the wake of the Los Angeles wildfires, he will receive the honor at next year’s gathering.
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Robinson started at WMG in 1995 after working at Mayer Katz Baker Leibowitz, which at the time did a significant amount of the label group’s legal work. Robinson got the top job in 2006 and helped steer the company through the worst years of the music business, to its 2013 acquisition of Parlophone Label Group from Universal Music Group, and into the streaming-led recovery and a successful 2020 initial public offering.
Like the rest of the industry, WMG is now at a point where streaming growth in developed markets is slowing and the challenges of artificial intelligence (AI) loom — and in a way that will especially test it as the smallest of the three majors. Which is why, Robinson says, “From my point of view, it’s important to be perceived as, and to be, the most artist-friendly, songwriter-friendly company” — a message that WMG sent by being the first major to adopt artist-friendly policies on “digital breakage” in 2009 and on sharing gains from equity sales, such as with Spotify in 2016. “Jac Holzman, when he started Elektra, used to have this love-and-affection clause in his contracts that said the label will treat artists with love and affection and the artist will treat the label with a modicum of respect,” Robinson recalls. “And it’s great because it brings to mind the imbalance: Artists will not always love their labels, but we always have to love them and we hope that they at least respect us.”
Your father is Irwin Robinson, the prominent publishing executive who ran Chappell/Intersong and then EMI Music Publishing. Did you purposefully decide to follow him into the same business?
That was how it ended up, but they say there are no accidents. In some ways, I was afraid to go into the music business. There were huge shoes for me to step into. I thought I wanted to be a doctor, and then I worked at a hospital one summer and I decided, “Maybe I don’t want to be a doctor.” I was a huge music fan as well as a singer, and I thought, “I’ll just go to law school and see what happens.” Maybe I was avoiding it.
Robinson’s father gave him this 1956 letter from legendary songwriter-composer Cole Porter to his lawyer, John Wharton, at Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison. “I like it because in a single letter, he talks about the relatively important issue of assigning his renewal rights to Chappell and the relatively unimportant issue of a songbook being able to stay on a piano rack,” he says. “God is in the details.”
Krista Schlueter
Billboard can reveal that you were the singer in a new wave band.
I was one of the singers. We were called The Doctors. The musicians in the band all wore scrubs, and we were the hit of Williams College campus for a year. In fact, they asked The Doctors to play at my college reunion and we’re doing it.
You’re one of the few people who has been in the same department at the same company since the Napster era. Any lessons from then on how the industry should deal with AI?
Probably to lean into change. Maybe there were people in 1999 at Warner Music Group who saw peer-to-peer coming, but I feel like we were caught very much off guard, and I don’t think that’s been the case with AI. Also, with peer-to-peer, there wasn’t a great deal around until iTunes in 2003, so we’re also in a better place that way. There are services we can strike deals with now.
What are the best- and worst-case scenarios for the industry for generative AI?
[That’s] probably less of a general counsel question than [one for] business development, but I think the worst-case scenario is that somehow it’s determined that you don’t need permission to train an AI model and the market is flooded with a huge volume of content that dilutes legitimate music, in the same way services are flooded now with music that very few people listen to — but in turbo. The best case is that AI becomes an incredible tool for artists and songwriters and lets them up their game and release content in languages they don’t speak.
“This is a 1994 photo from my wedding of
my then-partners from Mayer Katz Baker Leibowitz & Roberts and their wives,” he says. “WMG was Mayer Katz’s biggest client.”
Krista Schlueter
The streaming model seems to be evolving. There’s talk of “Streaming 2.0.” What kind of terms are you looking for now in streaming deals?
Trying to lock in per-subscriber minimums and reduce discounts for family plans and so on. That’s where we are focused.
When you started in the music business, there were six major labels. Now there are three. Does that change the nature of competition?
Even though there are only three majors, it feels like it’s never been more competitive. All you have to do is look at the change in artist deals over time.
I’m assuming you mean that deals now favor artists? Is it harder to invest in them under these circumstances?
No. Every year, our A&R spend increases. When I started, we were getting eight-album deals, but we were signing artists where, because there was no internet, their following was probably their hometown and they needed a huge amount of development. Today, we hardly ever sign an artist that doesn’t have a significant social media presence, and those artists don’t need as much development.
“Believe it or not,” Robinson says, he has had the same office chair for 30 years. “It definitely looks like a chair from 1995, but I just can’t seem to let go of it.”
Krista Schlueter
Now you also compete with distribution deals.
From an artist’s point of view, there’s a trade-off. In a distribution deal, you’re getting a bigger piece of the pie, but you’re getting less development and it’s a shorter-term relationship, so there’s probably not going to be as much investment. If you sign a frontline label deal, you’re committing to more albums and you’re getting a smaller piece of the pie, but you are getting a whole team of people behind you to develop your career. The great thing is that artists have more choice than ever.
How do you make sure artist contracts feel like win-win deals?
Deals get renegotiated all the time if they’re out of sync. If there’s an artist with a small record deal that has tremendous success, the economics of their next albums are going to look different. We’re in the personal services business and we’re in the relationship business. We want to maintain the best relationships with artists and songwriters.
Is there a deal you did that you’re especially proud of?
When we bought Parlophone Label Group, that was a huge regulatory fight, and I would say it was a win-win. UMG had to sell Parlophone, we were the best buyer, and they were looking for a good price, which today looks like a really low price. We paid about $800 million, probably about a seven-and-a-half times multiple, which at the time was huge. We were much more U.S. weighted in our revenue, and we bought a bunch of European assets. So it rebalanced us in terms of geography, and we acquired great repertoire and some great artists.
What has been some of the most memorable litigation that you have overseen? The case in which Led Zeppelin was sued for copyright infringement by a trustee for the estate of Spirit frontman Randy Wolfe comes to mind.
The exciting thing about the Zeppelin case was not only winning, after having been dealt a bunch of blows — we won in trial court and we were reversed — but changing the trajectory of copyright infringement litigation. It was a beat-back of what was, I think, the bad law of the “Blurred Lines” case.
Robinson never met Prince, but he is such a big fan that two people gave him signed limited-edition lithographs of the New Yorker cover commemorating the artist’s death. “He was an incredibly distinctive artist. For his first album, Warner Records let him do everything. They basically said, ‘Go in the studio and do it.’ That didn’t happen much in 1977.”
Krista Schlueter
This story appears in the Jan. 25, 2025 issue of Billboard.
BLACKPINK member JISOO has signed a global label deal with Warner Records for her solo output, the company announced Tuesday (Jan. 28). Warner will release JISOO’s debut solo mini album, AMORTAGE, on Feb. 14. “I’m excited about this new era and the continuation of my musical journey,” said JISOO in a statement. “I feel like […]
Universal Music Group chairman and CEO Lucian Grainge delivered an update on the company’s response to the Los Angeles wildfires on Tuesday, writing in a staff memo obtained by Billboard that while many evacuated employees have returned home, others remain displaced, while some have “lost their homes completely.”
Grainge said the Santa Monica-based company is actively supporting affected employees by providing resources to meet both immediate and long-term needs. Over 100 employees have volunteered to help colleagues through various means, such as offering shelter, babysitting and donating clothes, he said.
Beyond internal support, UMG has been involved in community relief efforts, including volunteering, providing meals and donating clothing and hotel rooms for displaced families. Additionally, Grainge said UMG has made financial contributions to several organizations supporting relief efforts, including the American Red Cross, California Community Foundation, The California Fire Foundation, Direct Relief, Entertainment Industry Foundation, L.A. Regional Food Bank, MusiCares, Music Health Alliance, Mutual AID Network L.A., Pasadena Humane Society and World Central Kitchen, among others.
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“What has impressed me the most throughout this tragic event is the fact that collectively we haven’t just made financial contributions, but so many of our colleagues have rolled up their sleeves and gone to work,” he said. “We know that even after every fire is extinguished the road to recovery will be very long. We will be there every step of the way.”
UMG announced earlier this month that it is canceling all of the company’s Grammy-related events, including its artist showcase and after-Grammy party, and will instead “redirect the resources that would have been used for those events to assist those affected by the wildfires.”
Read Grainge’s full memo below:
Dear Colleagues,
I’m writing to update you on our efforts related to the Los Angeles fires. In short, while many of our evacuated employees have fortunately been able to return to their homes, others who are in the most seriously affected areas remain displaced and will be so for some time to come. Some have lost their homes entirely.
We are working closely with those affected employees, providing them a range of resources and support to meet their immediate individual or family needs. Following meetings with the team of UMG leaders that I mentioned in my prior note, we are also determining the best ways to help these employees going forward. And in addition to the company’s support, more than 100 employees have volunteered to help their colleagues—from opening their homes to babysitting, dog walking, donating clothes, and more.
In terms of recovery of the broader community, from Day One we’ve been on the ground helping wherever we can. Whether it’s volunteering at relief organizations, providing meals to first responders and affected community members, donating clothing or providing hotel rooms to displaced families.
And in addition to all this, we’ve made financial contributions to a range of organizations, including the American Red Cross, California Community Foundation, The California Fire Foundation, Direct Relief, Entertainment Industry Foundation, L.A. Regional Food Bank, MusiCares, Music Health Alliance, Mutual AID Network L.A., Pasadena Humane Society, World Central Kitchen, and more.
What has impressed me the most throughout this tragic event is the fact that collectively we haven’t just made financial contributions, but so many of our colleagues have rolled up their sleeves and gone to work.
We know that even after every fire is extinguished the road to recovery will be very long. We will be there every step of the way.
You can read more about these efforts in our latest edition of our All Together Now bi-weekly newsletter.
I’m so enormously proud of the fact that so many of you have shown up to help our community and your colleagues. I’m grateful but not surprised. As a company, this is who we are.
Lucian
In the summer of 2006, Madonna touched down in New York for a run of shows at Madison Square Garden in support of her album Confessions on a Dance Floor. One young attendee was Val Blavatnik. “It was my first live-music experience and I was just so blown away,” he recalls. “I knew from then, even before our family acquired Warner, this was an industry I wanted to be involved in.”
Blavatnik’s father, Len, founder of Access Industries, subsequently bought Warner Music Group in 2011. A dozen years later, Val made good on his childhood dream, starting as senior director of business development at Warner Chappell Music. In April 2023, he was elected to WMG’s board of directors.
Val currently attends Harvard Business School, but he has been in close conversation with the company’s executive leaders, including his friend Elliot Grainge, the new chief executive of Atlantic Music Group. “Elliot and I got very close” during the negotiations that preceded WMG’s purchase of 51% of Grainge’s 10K Projects label in 2023, Val explains. “I advocated for the original 10K acquisition and for Elliot in his new role at Atlantic.” He clarifies, however, “As a board member, I am proud of my role, but it was [WMG CEO] Robert [Kyncl’s] decision.”
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You spent a few years at Warner Chappell and investment bank LionTree before joining the WMG board. Why was it the right time to make that move?
Well, I was very honored to be invited, and I take the responsibility extremely seriously. There are a wide range of perspectives on our board. It’s a very collaborative room to be in. Being the youngest person on the board, I’ve tried to make my role about bringing a different perspective to the conversation. I’m also one of the people on the board who has worked directly with artists, managing them, being in the studio, helping to sign them. That on-the-ground, in-the-room experience is vital.
How closely do you work with leadership?
Robert is always open-minded, and we have some fascinating and productive discussions. Learning about publishing from Guy [Moot] and Carianne [Marshall] was invaluable, and I’ve been very fortunate to work with Tom [Corson] and Aaron [Bay-Schuck] on signing two young acts we’re very passionate about. [Blavatnik declined to name the acts.]
I’m probably most involved with Atlantic. The team and I have a fantastic, ongoing open dialogue. I’m fortunate to be able to help in any capacity which benefits the business — from strategizing about the future, to helping close an artist signing, all the way through giving my two cents on a song.
Why is Grainge the right pick to lead AMG?
Elliot is an incredibly talented leader. It’s been an absolute pleasure to work and collaborate with him. Most importantly, artists love him, his team is unbelievably passionate and committed. He has brilliant creative instincts, he’s fantastic at creating huge cultural moments, and he has a deep grasp of business. That makes him a triple threat.
Do you think the music business needs a generational changing of the guard?
The music business should constantly evolve and innovate, like any other successful business. It’s not so much about a generational shift, but more about having executives with bold, fresh ideas and the ambition to deliver outstanding results.
This story appears in the Jan. 25, 2025, issue of Billboard.
In early December, Island Records co-chairmen/co-CEOs Justin Eshak and Imran Majid traveled to the north coast of Jamaica to visit the 87-year-old founder of the label they now run, Chris Blackwell. The executives were coming off one of the best years in Island’s recent history, and three weeks before their visit, two of Island’s recent breakthroughs, Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan, both scored Grammy nominations in the categories of record, song and album of the year and best new artist — the first time in history a label had two acts nominated for each of those honors in the same year.
That wasn’t the reason for the trip, however. It was about “respect,” Majid says. The two had visited Blackwell at his Goldeneye resort in 2021, before they officially took over Island at the beginning of 2022, to meet him and pay homage to the institution he had launched in 1959, which became the label home of Bob Marley, U2, Cat Stevens and Grace Jones.
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This time, “It kind of felt like visiting family or a friend,” Eshak says. “As opposed to last time when we were like, ‘Oh, f–k!’ ”
During those three years, Eshak and Majid have taken Island from a label with an illustrious past but moribund present to one of the premier destinations for artists to break — and 2024 was when it all came together. First came Carpenter, who scored her first top 40 hit on the Hot 100 in January with “Feather” before steadily building momentum through the spring. “Espresso,” her first top 10, followed, and by June, Carpenter had her first No. 1 with “Please Please Please.” At the end of August, her album Short n’ Sweet debuted atop the Billboard 200.
Roan’s ascent was almost simultaneous, fueled by strong word-of-mouth and a series of increasingly bigger festival appearances that crested in the summer, when her single “Good Luck, Babe!” reached No. 4 on the Hot 100; her album, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess, climbed into the top five of the Billboard 200; and she broke an attendance record for her Lollapalooza performance in Chicago. So when the Grammy nominations arrived, Island’s chief executives were not surprised. “Once the two of them started to control the zeitgeist,” Eshak says, “it just felt like the appropriate result.”
From the outside, the rise of the two artists — one a former Disney star who refashioned herself through clever live shows and radio, the other a budding queer pop icon who had been dumped by the major-label system early on and rebooted her career by touring and building a fan community — appeared to have reached that point through different paths. Eshak and Majid don’t see it that way. “You almost had to be at the shows before the success to understand,” Majid says. “That was what we bet on really early — [they were] artists that had such an engaged fan base from touring, streaming almost came secondary to that. At one point we were like, ‘Once this hits the masses, it could have a global impact.’ ”
By mid-2024, the narrative was set: Carpenter and Roan were leading a roster of artists who built cross-sectional fan bases that pushed beyond typical genre or cultural tropes. And for the first time in years, Island Records had returned to the roots Blackwell had nurtured in the latter half of the 20th century — a label where artists felt comfortable, heard and supported, and where good music was more important than commerciality.
Which is not to say that Island hasn’t succeeded commercially. The label ended 2024 with a 2.49% current market share — quadrupling the 0.62% it had in 2023. Island’s market share is included under Republic Records, but broken out on its own, it is the ninth-best of last year despite a wide reorganization at Universal Music Group in February that included extensive layoffs that affected all labels at the company.
Eshak and Majid’s greatest achievement, then, was to take a label with 30 dedicated employees (sharing some services like radio and marketing within REPUBLIC Collective) and create a culture that let its artists and staff flourish creatively, commercially and artistically.
They are now reaping the rewards. As 2024 wound down, new signees Gigi Perez and Lola Young landed their first Hot 100 hits, “Sailor Song” at No. 22 and “Messy” at No. 54, respectively.
Now, some in the industry are comparing Eshak and Majid’s success to that of John Janick’s at Interscope, which has turned young artists like Billie Eilish and Olivia Rodrigo into superstars at a time when it’s becoming increasingly difficult to break artists.
The trick is to maintain that success and future-proof against inevitable cold streaks. “What humbles you is when you think you have magic and it doesn’t work,” Majid says. “Justin and I are fortunate that we have 20 years of experience of what we think the right attitude to have is and what is not.”
“We just feel like there’s a new wave of artists that fit our ethos and that we can plug into what we do and give them a bespoke campaign,” Eshak says. “And we feel like we have the team. It felt really great going to Jamaica. Imran and I were sitting there like, ‘Our team’s got this.’ ”
This story appears in the Jan. 25, 2025, issue of Billboard.
Yo Gotti has welcomed another addition to the CMG family as Zillionaire Doe signs to the Memphis native’s imprint. Billboard learned on Tuesday (Jan. 21) that the ink is dry on the deal with the burgeoning Dallas-bred rapper, who looked up to Gotti growing up. “I’m really excited to work with Gotti and the CMG […]